


Frenzy

by moreagaara



Series: Before the Imperium [1]
Category: Warhammer 40.000
Genre: Altered Mental States, Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Historical, Blood, Blood Magic, Blood and Gore, Blood and Violence, Cannibalism, Cross-Posted on deviantArt, Deviates From Canon, Emperor Revived, Gen, Literature, Mental Anguish, Mental Coercion, Mental Health Issues, Mental Instability, Originally Posted Elsewhere, Originally Posted on deviantART, Posted Elsewhere, Pre-Canon, Sci-Fi, fan fiction
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-20
Updated: 2019-04-20
Packaged: 2020-08-20 16:43:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,223
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20231071
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/moreagaara/pseuds/moreagaara
Summary: And now, a short trip back in time to when Daenus was overwhelmed by Khorne!  He ate people.Peep brigade ownership:Games Workshop:  Khorne, Horus, teh EmprahMe:  The writing, the concept, and the Emperor's name.It is a good name.





	Frenzy

**Author's Note:**

> And now, a short trip back in time to when Daenus was overwhelmed by Khorne! He ate people. 
> 
> Peep brigade ownership:  
Games Workshop: Khorne, Horus, teh Emprah  
Me: The writing, the concept, and the Emperor's name.
> 
> It is a good name.

_No more excuses! _a voice hissed in Daenus’s head. He flinched, squeezed his eyes shut, waited for another round of agony from his blood god. Reflected anger seethed through his body; he tried to harness it, to use it as fuel, to get up and try to kill something _anything _so he could please his blood god, just one more chance, that’s all he needed—

Instead, he held nothing; his blood god’s rage was as distant and insubstantial as the wind. His body, which had been being warmed by that rage for so long, went suddenly cold; the floor felt like ice, and the air he breathed in was stale and smelled only of emptiness. He wailed wordlessly in protest—really, he could please the blood god, he wanted to, he just needed to get out—

But the blood god only scoffed. _I took a risk on you, psyker, because you could spill so much blood so quickly and your version of wizardry was at least passably honorable. You have failed me for too long. Kill something today, and _maybe _I’ll let you have relief._

Then Daenus’s head was silent. Empty. He was alone, for the first time since Sanguinius had died. He screamed; couldn’t tell if it was inside his own head or not. “Come back! _Come back!_” he shrieked, but no answer came.

There was a noise nearby, though the sound came muffled to ears unsharpened from the silence in his mind. Vague memories told him that that sound meant someone was coming, someone whose blood sang with power. Wild need shorted out all other thought; he leaped towards the intruder, didn’t care who it was, tore at their flesh with bare hands tipped with claws formed of blood magic. He started to sharpen them with the stranger’s own blood, but the stranger only had to look at him, and his claws dissolved; normally he would have stopped, but his need was too deep this time. There was a knife in the stranger’s pocket; it was small, folded into itself, but Daenus remembered just enough to get it open and resume ripping, tearing, _killing_—

This time, the stranger shoved against his chest and hurled him away onto the cold floor. There was a sharp crack as Daenus’s arm broke, but something else was wrong too. He was breathing, gasping for air, but nothing made it to his head, around his body. He didn’t dare move until he understood the problem, but he failed. He tried to collapse himself down into his animal self—the animal could keep him safe, it had honor, it usually could please the blood god—

Power from the blood god, power he couldn’t touch, power the blood god wouldn’t let him use stopped him. _Pathetic. Weak, worthless, useless without your magic._

He couldn’t breathe!

_Excuses again! The animal is part of my gifts as well, psyker!_

Air was starting to suffuse his body again. Someone was touching him. He flinched, expecting pain, but the only pain came from his blood god who hated him, hated his magic, hated _failure_. He shrank away, deep into his mind, to a place where neither reality nor his blood god could touch him. Everything would be okay when he came back in a while…a few hours, a few days…

Yet all was still silent when he finally crawled out of his hole. Still his body was cold, too slow, too weak, everything still came in muffled whispers, every outline still fuzzy and wavery. He sobbed, tried rocking himself; the motion usually helped him, usually calmed him down, but someone was holding him again.

He wrenched away. Fear screamed through him, ruled him. He couldn’t fight, wasn’t strong enough, so he bolted. Up something, down something else, eventually finding a dark hole only just wide enough to allow him in. Something, someone at the entrance, a tone meant to be soothing, comforting, maybe trying to offer him help, but nothing no one could help him now.

The blood god would have none of him. He had failed the blood god, was himself a failure, nothing he could do was right or good, and it was so easy to please the blood god. You only had to kill, Daenus only had to kill, and he couldn’t even do that right, couldn’t stop depending on his vile sorcery…

The rocking wasn’t helping. Perhaps the smell of blood, the taste of it…his heart fluttered as he painted his face with his arm blood, but there was no response from the blood god. More was needed; he made his fingertips into claws again, ripped at his cheeks, his forehead. Nothing. His hands roamed downward—_hadn’t his arm broken?_—found his chest, ripped and tore at that. Still nothing. Perhaps if he clawed at his stomach, his legs, his insides—

By this point, the pain had flooded his system, and he was gasping between his sobs. He refused to let his magic heal the wounds the way it always did; he needed to hurt, needed to let the blood spill, so the god could at least have _something_, but someone else was making the wounds heal, the pain ease. He tried to reinjure himself, tried to injure the healer, but the healer would have none of it. Daenus would be healed, and the healer was the one with final say.

He collapsed. Someone was holding him again, and they were warm. They were singing, or maybe speaking rhythmically, were offering comfort. Anything would do. Daenus latched onto this force, this one that didn’t judge him, didn’t care that he was a failure, couldn’t even manage to kill an intruder into his home with a knife. There was a bellow from his god, promising further pain and anguish, and Daenus retreated further against this other force.

Words started to filter into his mind. _You remember Versailles? _He did. The gardens, the sun king…the world outside the palace, streets filling with blood, demons screaming their glee as people slaughtered each other in the streets, Daenus had been there, hadn’t helped kill—truly he was a failure, since he hadn’t even picked up a gun—

There was a flower in his memory. He shuddered in the arms of whoever held him, trying to see it. A little girl was handing it to him. He had…he had protected her from the screaming mob outside the building. Her mother behind her. Words he couldn’t remember the meaning of rang in his head. He answered, need swirled in him. They had to escape, but had to wait until it was dark to get on board a ship…the ship was going to go across a sea, to…to somewhere. Someone was talking, in halting, stuttering sentences, the words slurring as he started to pay attention.

Failure. Couldn’t even talk right. Blood, that would help, more blood, he raised his arm so he could bite—

Someone else’s hand stopped him, gently rocked him back and forth. Long smooth motions, trying to relax his heartbeat. _It’s okay, it’s okay, you’re fine…_didn’t whoever it was know, nothing was fine, nothing could ever be fine again. He collapsed back into the hole in his mind. Something crawled into the empty place where he had been, but he couldn’t make himself care.

A dream, he thought. He was standing on his own—too hard an action, staying close to the ground was easier and better, it would catch you more easily if you fell—had a butcher’s knife in his hand. There was another in the room. If he could just kill them, he could please the blood god. Attacking from behind wouldn’t be honorable…some noise split his throat, the figure turned, he lunged. The knife sank deep into its chest, ripped out its lungs, opened its belly, this smelled so good—

He couldn’t breathe again. It was impossible to continue; his blood—it wouldn’t carry any air…that’s what had happened the last time. In the dream, Daenus fell over, unable to remember how to use his blood magic at all. He couldn’t even remember how to call to it on instinct, but through the dream he tried, but some force slid his attempts away. Something laughed inside his mind.

_You think running away will help you? A true warrior faces any threat head on, and then he wins or he dies. You failed us on both counts. You failed our god. You don’t deserve a body, so this one is mine now._

That sounded right. He nodded, started to turn away, back into the hole, back where he didn’t have to think or feel—but someone was screaming, a hand grabbed at him, pulled him back into sensation. He couldn’t breathe, until he could.

Some new understanding gnawed at him. Brother. The man who held him as he coughed and gasped for air was his brother. Scent-information from the roused animal side of his mind streamed into him. Healer. Invader. Food-bringer…the beast in him remembered all these things. This man who was his brother was familiar, understood, a known quantity. Good.

The beast shoved him away, shut down his thoughts. He let it, didn’t want to think. What little he could still process despite its influence was too strange, too harsh. Beast would take care of it. It huffed agreement, allowed Daenus’s stranger-brother to hold it. Comfort it. Calm it. It seemed to think that the blood god…wasn’t good? But how could that be…?

Days slipped past while Daenus considered that opinion. Days the Beast registered as passing only because the sky turned dark at the end of them, days where Beast obeyed his brother, and was allowed to move about the upper portion of their den. There was a bath. Daenus smelled vanilla. His brother combed his hair, sang/spoke to them…

Maybe the beast wasn’t a gift from the blood god. Maybe…Daenus had made it himself. To protect him when the blood god surged through his body. It felt like a simpler form of himself, a way he could safely interact with reality…maybe the beast should stay in control forever. It would keep Daenus safe. More days passed, more and more days without blood being spilled, and the blood god grew angrier and angrier…

His brother was leaving a while. He would be back in three days. Daenus had the house to himself; he wasn’t to leave, but he could go anywhere he wanted in it. For the first day, the Beast was uncertain of what to do, and so ceded control to Daenus. Daenus could think of little to do except paint, in patterns that seemed right and correct for reasons he couldn’t fully understand, all over the floors and walls. Then he climbed up onto Horus’s bed—the one Beast had been sharing with him—and breathed. The scents were calming, familiar. He knew them both very well. He lay down, closed his eyes, entering a trance that served as sleep—

A sound shattered the trance. Daenus lay still, but alert, listening. There were voices, and they weren’t familiar. They were laughing, entering the house. Invaders.

They had to die. Everything in Daenus demanded their deaths. Their blood, their screams, their skulls…he carefully slipped off the bed and crept towards the nearest voice. It was just in the next room. Honor mattered less than killing. The invader was yanked backwards, off his feet, hurled against the tile, fell into the bathtub. He moved in pain, but Daenus was already on him, teeth flashing as he went for the man’s throat, ripping it out before he had a chance to scream a warning.

Warmth suffused him. His senses sharpened. He shivered, reached down, ripped off a leg without effort. Another of the invaders had come into the room to see what was going on, had time to yell before Daenus tore him open; the only magic he was using was to give himself claws, and that only so his hands had points to properly dig into his enemy. He grabbed onto the second invader’s ribcage, pulled with all his strength—

It came free. He hurled the removed sternum down the stairs, against the partially open door; the force of the blow slammed it shut. Daenus dipped his hands into the bleeding hole, smeared the blood over himself, humming in delight. The victim was still moving a little, so he grabbed onto the bottom of the hole and yanked upwards, then licked the side with muscle attached.

Someone yelled behind him, and he whipped around as they fired a gun at him. Guns…he remembered guns…

_They’re all dead. Would you like to know how they died?_

He screamed, put power behind it. The invader holding the gun fell, clutched her belly, spat up blood. Then he was on her, ripping her to pieces, just like he had killed them. There was another gunshot; this one knocked Daenus over, off his now-dead third victim. He lay on the ground, mewled, pretended weakness. The fourth invader stepped closer, leveled the shotgun at his head, fired—

Missed. Daenus simply moved too fast. A single swat broke the man’s neck, but that wasn’t satisfying enough; Daenus dug his fingers into his chest, grabbed, pulled out something that still beat—

Something crashed behind him. Again he turned. A fifth invader, too terrified to defend herself; she had dropped the treasures she clearly meant to steal. Daenus grinned, held up the heart he’d liberated, took a bite. The rage inside him exploded in delighted starbursts, so he ate the rest of the heart as he advanced, trembling with barely contained/containable strength.

His head tilted when the fifth invader’s mouth moved. _Run! Get help, I’ll hold him off! _He heard, distantly, as if through a veil of streaming liquid. Someone else, someone he couldn’t see, but there were footsteps running for one of the doors. His current victim had a gun too, tried to fire it at him, but didn’t get it level before he had torn her hands off and she started to scream.

He listened carefully over her screams for the sixth invader; the door they were trying wouldn’t open, so they were moving towards another. His brother’s wards…they must be keeping the invaders inside too. Good, then…no need to rush this one who was trying to crawl away. He stomped on her legs, broke them; she tried to push him off with the ruins of her arms, but merely clamped his jaws around one, then began gently peeling the skin off the other. Her screaming was starting to hurt his ears, so he opened her belly and pulled the organs out. Her liver tasted delicious, and she was silent and unmoving by the time he finished.

But now the whole house was silent…he was certain he’d heard a sixth invader. Quietly he moved from the fifth, listening closely for any sounds and watching every corner for frightened movement. His stomach rumbled; pure delight shivered through each of his muscles…

He had only killed one where the front door opened onto the stairs. Yet there were two bodies there. The dead body, the one he knew he had killed, had been pulled on top of the second, so he pushed it off to examine it. This new body was covered in blood, and lay still and silent. Daenus crouched over it, sniffing at its neck. He growled; this one smelled alive.

Nothing to do but investigate further. He grabbed it by the head and pulled it towards a room he dimly remembered—something about glass and gardens, the memory disappeared in a swirl of meaningless thought. Thought didn’t matter when there was blood to be spilled…he dropped the body on the floor, laid an ear against its chest. It was breathing, but shallowly, trying to not give itself away.

It failed the second Daenus bit a finger off. He spat the appendage out; there was too much bone for his taste. But now that it had revealed itself to be alive, he dug his fingers into its shoulders and leaned into its face. “Fight or die,” he growled. Then he got up, swiped something sharp down off the counter at the sixth invader. It landed within his reach, and Daenus stood in the only exit.

The sixth invader understood. It grabbed the sharp object and attacked Daenus, who played with his new toy for an hour. Every time the invader flagged, Daenus would strike; light clawings meant to encourage the invader to keep going and put up a decent fight. In the end, the sixth invader let out a yell and plunged the sharp object directly into Daenus’s chest, aiming for the heart.

He missed; the blade hit a rib, deflected into the lung next to the heart instead. Daenus laughed. “Better,” he told the invader. Then he picked him up and hurled him against the floor with all his enhanced strength. Something big shattered, and the invader moved no more. At least now he had put up a decent fight, and now his skull was worthy to be placed on the skull throne.

Ripping the head off the neck took much doing, but Daenus eventually managed by biting through the fleshy part at the front and ripping the spine in two. He cleaned the skull of flesh lovingly, occasionally paused to eat some choice piece of muscle from the rest of the body the blood god cared little for. Only when the skull was clean did he take it down to his den in the basement, placed it on the blanket he slept on, arranged it neatly in the middle—his blood god could easily find it there—and returned to the corpse of the last invader.

He ate. At first in a frenzy, but slower as his belly became uncomfortably full. The heart, he wanted to eat the heart; that had tasted best from the other invader he had sampled, better even than the liver, but there was a sound behind him.

A seventh invader? He tried to spin around and attack, but his body responded sluggishly; he couldn’t move with anything like the speed he wanted. Memory fired; this seventh invader was his brother. In the time it took him to debate further attack, his brother placed a hand on his forehead and forced a trance on him. Dimly he felt his brother pick him up, carry him down to the basement. The skull was kicked to the side—he tried to break himself out of the trance, _how dare he_—and Daenus was settled, wrapped tightly in the blanket so that he couldn’t move. Another dose of calm surged through him, and he had no choice but to sleep.

Somewhere above him there were voices. He couldn’t follow what they were saying, and half didn’t want to. At least a day must have passed, since the blood god was angry with him again. A failure that he hadn’t been able to kill his brother when he entered the house, that he hadn’t kept the brutality going. It was enough for Daenus that he could kill so easily when his prey came to him, though. It had to be.  



End file.
